Flounder
by Panfila
Summary: Did you?


**Post-Season 7, Pre-Season 8**

* * *

><p>Kevin approaches the reception desk . He looks to the left and right, then at the redheaded receptionist staring intently at her papers. He opens his mouth and waits a second before continuing.<p>

"Hey, Erin… um, have the revised tax forms come in yet?" She doesn't respond and Kevin lets a few awkward seconds tick by before trying again. "Uh… Erin? Eh-rin?" She abruptly sticks a skinny arm over the reception counter holding a small stack of paper and Kevin almost flinches at the gesture. "Oh, thank you."

He ambles away slowly, sighing in relief.

From a distance, Jim watches Erin pull her arm back over the ledge and go sullenly back to the papers before her. He half-frowns and leans in toward Pam. "Hey," he whispers. "Do you think you could say something to Erin?"

Pam looks up from a list of customer details on her legalpad, glances at him, at Erin (still motionless at her desk), and back at him with a concerned look.

"What, why me? Why not Toby? Or Phyllis? She's like her office mom."

"I don't think Toby is the best person for this kinda stuff and Phyllis already tried and couldn't really get anything out of her."

"Well, what can I say?"

He shrugs. "I don't know, maybe just reassure her about the whole Andy thing. Share a personal story with her or something. Work some girl talk."

"Why are you two whispering?" Dwight towers behind them, eyes darting back and forth between the two. He speaks without moving, doing his best to look imposing. "Are you conspiring?"

Pam shakes her head and tries to wave him away. "No, Dwight, we were just talking about Cece—"

"Because if you are, I will not hesitate to report you. I think management would be very interested to know that—" He glances back at Michael's empty office and stops mid-sentence. For a few seconds, he just stares off into space, before finishing his thought lifelessly. "Never mind. Do whatever you want…"

"Thanks for the permission, Commissar Shrute."

Dwight plods back to his desk. "Communism is no laughing matter, Jim," he answers, without any usual enthusiasm.

They both stare at him weirdly, but move back together as Pam whispers: "Okay, yeah. I think I can try something."

"Alright, good luck."

"Wait, since when are you so invested in a co-worker's happiness?"

Jim smiles matter-of-factly. "I happen to have a personal investment in the welfare of receptionists everywhere, past and present."

Pam responds with a playfully stern look. "Halpert, you are not as cute as you think you are."

"Also, I can't handle asking customers to re-fax anymore contracts because they get to me two hours late smeared with tears."

"I'll see what I can do."

~the office~

Pam approaches the reception desk. She looks to the left and right, then at Erin staring intensely into her computer screen. She opens her mouth and waits a second before continuing.

"Hey, Erin, can I talk to you for a second?"

After a brief pause, she looks up at Pam and lets her continue.

"So… mornings must be quieter for you now that Michael's gone."

Erin nods in a agreement but makes no other effort to communicate.

"Must be nice not to have to do all that extra work."

Erin starts to repeat her reponse then stops abruptly. Her eyes open pleadingly. "No. I have—I'm really busy. I have a lot of stuff to take care of in the office. Lots of copies and papers and things. I'm running around pretty much the whole day doing things when I'm not taking calls."

Erin dips her head slightly behind the counter; her eyes moisten at the corners and she lowers her voice to a whisper. "Pam, are you telling me you think they're going to fire me?"

Pam glances at the camera, panicked. "No! Oh my God, no Erin! I wasn't trying to say anything like that. I was just trying to talk—"

"I'm sorry, Pam, I just don't think I should talk right now. At all. Ever. I don't want—I really don't want to get fired."

She goes back to the computer and clicks furiously on the My Computer icon.

Pam opens her mouth to say something... but just closes it again in surrender. She goes back to her desk.

~the office~

"And so that's why it's paramount you picture all the personnel reports eventually ending up at me until we have a new office manager."

Toby steps forward and clicks the laptop mouse to move to next PowerPoint slide. A small table of data wipes onto the screen and he looks down at his notecard.

The office workers sit in the room in typical state: bored and barely attentive. Erin sits against the glass wall, her notebook on her lap and a pen in her mouth. Pam sits to her right, completely ignoring the presentation.

"Erin." Pam pushes a notecard with "want to have lunch?" written neatly toward her neighbor.

Erin doesn't respond and, instead, scribbles something down attentively.

"Later, we can deal with sorting out the requests. We're going to have everything running as usual, but we're going to need your cooperation to make sure nothing gets lost in the shuffle…"

Pam nudges her shoulder softly, trying to slip her the note, but Erin takes down more notes and doesn't respond in any way.

Finally, Pam looks over to the notebook and reads the notes:

_Paramount Pictures,_

_Toby = new office manager_

_everyone running as usual_

She sighs and gives up.

~the office~

Pam walks into the break room and sees Erin sitting at the far table, staring forlornly into her yogurt cup. She starts to walk to her, but shakes her head, and goes to the snack machine instead. Staring at the snacks, Pam sighs silently, and turns around. "Hey, are you alright, Erin?"

She nods. "Yeah, I'm just… just eating my yogurt." For a few silent seconds, they just stay in their places. "It's really… it's a really sad yogurt."

Pam smiles cornily. "Yeah, whenever I don't get my mixed berry I get pretty depres—"

Erin audibly chokes back a sob and hangs her head lower. Walking away from the machines, Pam pulls out a plastic chair and sits beside her. "Hey, everything's gonna be okay." She doesn't respond. "Sometimes people just need some time and space to work through their problems and make the right decision."

"I'm just..." She sighs aloud and wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. "My family keeps losing people."

"Oh, Erin, I'm so sorry. I had no idea someone in your family... passed away. Are you okay? Was it from your foster family or your… was it another family member?"

Erin looks back at her like she's crazy. "No, nobody died. I don't mean my real family. I meant… Well, sometimes I imagine that people in the office are like my new foster family."

She straightens herself up a bit and drops her spoon into the empty cup. "Phyllis is like a mom, and Michael is like a dad, and Holly is a new evil stepmom, and Kelly is a twin sister BFF, and Ryan is that weird cousin that keeps trying to kiss you in the mouth even though you're cousins and that's gross—"

Pam looks up at the camera with a shocked expression… then reluctantly frowns and nods her head in understanding. "Yeah, that actually makes perfect sense."

"And Andy is like that cool kid who lives next door, and you're like that older sister that everybody loves and everybody thinks is wonderful and perfect compared to the stupid little redhead sister—"

"Woah, Erin. Nobody thinks that—"

"Yes, they do! You're like a better version of me! You're totally pretty and super smart and you're married to a great guy and you have a beautiful baby and you wear fancy womansuits to work."

"Well, you can always buy some sui—"

"And you're really hot."

Pam opens and closes her mouth. "Well, I—thanks, but—"

Toby walks into the break room, scanning the snacks. He stops at the far machine before suddenly noticing the two ladies sitting silently. Spying Erin's red eyes, he takes a step toward them and opens his mouth.

Pam shakes her head with wide eyes.

Toby bobs his head.

Pam shakes her head again.

Toby insists.

Pam mouths 'Girl Problems.'

He shrugs and walks right back out.

"And everybody loves you more. For the longest time after I started, people kept coming up to the desk and calling me 'Pam' and getting disappointed when it was just me. Nobody talked with me in the break room but everybody talked about how 'Pam is so ballsy' and 'Pam is crazy for leaving with Michael.' And they would say that 'Pam never used to forget to bring fax confirmations' and 'Pam knew how to work the copy machine' and 'Pam's boobs were perkier.'

A beat.

"Was that last one Kevin?"

"Yeah."

Pam sighs.

"Everybody loves you and wishes I put out good candies like you and could collate faxed contracts like you and remembered how to handle inventory submissions—"

"—Hey, those… those can be pretty tricky. I don't think anybody blames you—"

"Even Michael likes you more than me. I had to work so hard to make him see that I could be as good as you when we went to Flood Elementary to deal with Scott's Tots and I could tell he missed you anyway. And now he's gone! Just like everyone else I like."

She looks down. "No one wants to stay with me."

"No Erin, of course that's not true."

"It is! It's very true!" She looks up, looking both sad and panicked. "M-my mom and dad. My foster brothers and sisters. Michael. Andy. My cat Whiskers. I don't know how to stop making them leave me."

A pregnant pause fills the break room. A few times, Pam tries to start a consoling speech, but ends up just opening and closing her mouth like a fish. She looks around the room at the little decoration that exists, looking as if the answers are written on the walls.

A couple minutes later, Pam finally just stares at the depressed receptionist. "Phyllis is still here, you know."

Erin looks up at her.

"And so is Kelly. And, even if you're going through a rough patch, Andy's still _here_. And so am I. Would we all be here if we didn't like you?"

"You guys work here."

"Yeah, well, would Kelly, Ryan, and Andy have done those weird—uh, cool—videos with you if they didn't want to spend time with you?"

"Maybe."

"Would Oscar have helped you play Scrabble? Would we have gone to the Glee party? Would Michael have taken you to lunch on Secretary's Day? Would we all have thrown you that birthday party?"

Erin sighs. "I guess not."

"Sometimes people leave, Erin. That's true. People leave and sometimes they never come back and sometimes..." Pam pauses for a moment and kind of gets lost in her own thoughts. "...sometimes they come straight back to you."

She comes back to the present and continues. "But you never know, so you might as well enjoy everyone as much as you can while you have them. And if you ever need someone to talk to when you're lonely..."

Pam swallows and straightens her back. "I could listen and maybe give you some… sisterly advice. And I can let you borrow a suit whenever you want."

"That sounds amazing!" Erin smiles behind her red eyes and looks more like her usual self than she has in over two weeks. She leans suddenly forward and throws her arms around Pam.

"Oh. I guess we're hugging now. Okay."

She moves the little bit of arm that's free to Erin's back, giving her a gentle pat. Erin breathes deeply like people do after a good cry and Pam smiles a bit to herself.

"And, how about instead of some perfect older sister, you just think of me as being just like you, okay? Just a little more experienced."

"Okay, I'll try." Erin laughs and lets her go. "Even though you're like a bajillion years older than me."

Pam's smile falters for a bit and she forces it back. "Yeah..."

They scoot out of their chairs and stand up; Erin picks up her trash and walks with Pam toward the door.

"Well, I guess this means that Jim won't have to watch me shower."

Pam goes wide-eyed. "What? Why would he—Why would you say that?"

"Because older sister's boyfriends have to watch younger sisters when they shower to make sure they clean properly."

Pam stares back in horror. "Where did you hear that?"

"When I was little, all of my foster sister Sarah's boyfriends made me—"

"Oh my God, Erin. Don't—" She hugs Erin again and looks desperately at the camera. "Don't do that, okay?"

"Not anymore, Pam. Duh," she says, smiling and rolling her eyes jokingly. She leaves the break room and reaches the kitchen. "I'm not seventeen anymore! Plus my foster brother Reed can help me when—"

"Wow! Why don't we have dinner some time?" Pam follows her through the kitchen. "Just you and me. It'll be nice, and we can… we can talk about _a lot_ of things that sisters should tell each other. Important things."

"Oh my God, a fancy Sisters Dinner?" Erin's face goes serious, her eyes almost sparkling. "I would be honored, Pam. Do I—Should I wear make up?"

"Uh… I guess, I mean, if you want."

"Okay, I'll go to Walmart and look for some new make up! Or maybe I can borrow some from Kelly, but she's a different skin color so her make up and jewelry and old clothes probably would look bad on me. That's what my foster sister Sheneneh told me when I was living with the Williams family."

She smiles at Pam.

Pam smiles back through a frozen smile.

"You are so special, Erin."

"Aw, thanks, Pam!" She walks out the kitchen door and back through the office confidently, smiling at everyone along the way and pluckily plopping herself down at her desk.

Pam watches her with a mix of pride and confusion, recognizing something very familiar in the receptionist's emotionally tumultuous lovelife and naive worldview. She slowly follows the path back to her desk and carefully sits down in her chair.

For a few minutes, she just looks at her blank computer monitor and thinks.

Silence.

"So, how'd it go?" Jim asks.

Pam pauses for a second before answering. "Let's take in a foster kid."

"That bad, huh?"

She smiles absent-mindedly. "You have no idea."


End file.
